In a dense forest lived a lion, the king of the forest, who appointed two monkeys as his chief assistant.
Both monkeys took pride in their job role and aspired to go above and beyond to make the lion happy.
One of the critical tasks assigned to the monkeys was to take note of all the discussions and arguments happening in the forest and any get-togethers.
One day the king summoned both the monkeys to his den. He asked them to give a detailed report of all the quarrels and arguments that had taken place over the last month.
The first monkey started reciting excitedly but struggled in highlighting the details. He stammered and corrected himself but couldn’t explain the scenarios perfectly.
The second monkey removed his hat and let out a parrot. He asked the parrot to start narrating all the arguments and details as is. While the parrot did so, the monkey prepared a quick summary of the root problems on a stone and presented it to the lion.
As expected, the lion was highly impressed by the second monkey, who delegated a pivotal task to the parrot and just focused on summarizing the problems.
Be like the second monkey! Outsource recording to a parrot–a conversation intelligence software
Why Is Storytelling Important For Today’s Businesses?
You read the short story above and resonated with the message. Would you have liked us to talk about the great features the software holds?
No. we wouldn’t have liked it either.
No matter what your age, listening to a story transports you mentally to another place and time - and who wouldn't appreciate that right now?
As kids, our teachers and parents invested in stories to reinforce important moral values like Selflessness, Kindness, Cleaniliess, Politeness, etc.
Strangely, even today, we associate those moral values to an animal or character from our childhood days.
But, what’s so unique about storytelling?
Stories make it easier to consume information and leave a lasting impression. We may forget who narrated the story, but the brain perfectly captures the story and the message.
Research says- the storyteller and the listener's brain waves actually start to synchronize, says Uri Hasson, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Princeton University. Researchers found that the more the listener understood the story, the more closely the brain wave patterns matched the storyteller's.
Now, businesses have started investing in stories. Because they have realized that stories speak louder than PowerPoint presentations.
So, What Are The Different Stories You Can Explore?
You can shift gears by investing in more stories and less product-centric talks as an organization.
Of course, corporate values, mission & vision matter, product details matter, but don’t get too absorbed in them. Make use of stories to highlight them better.
Wondering how?
Here are 4 types of stories that work beautifully in the B2B business world.
1. Company’s story
To understand this first read the first section of this blog.
The previous blog must have given you a clear idea of why Convin happened? And what were the founders thinking?
Company’s existence stories sell like fire–building a foundation for the marketing and sales content.
Organization birth stories generally convey an emotional appeal and help in understanding the core values of the company.
The story behind a company’s success is another way to highlight the talent and the toil & gone in building the products and a reliable brand.
Today, branding is also relying on storytelling to reach more target audiences.
2. Product’s manufacturing story
Building a product flooded with features is a great way to start.
The product may touch millions of people and life.
But why does the product seem like a great idea? What’s the inspiration behind the creation?
These are the fundamental questions the audience wants to learn.
Just imagine a product like Google Maps. Aren’t we all a fan of the application?
While the product is an excellent addition to our day-to-day life, the simple story behind its existence makes it even more exciting.
The Guardian captured the story of Google Maps and made it resonate with an ordinary man.
Even a simple coffee powder can be sold in the market with the help of the product manufacturing story.
The origin of the coffee beans to the processing of the powder is exciting to a coffee lover.
3. Customer stories
Customer stories are a BIG hit as social proofs in the market.
All departments are using it by far–where marketing is making a fortune. LOL
Sales teams need customer stories more than anyone.
To earn the trust and credibility of prospects, a client success story is mandatory.
For instance,
We tell you that Conversation intelligence is an excellent tool for improving your follow-up activities. Would you agree? No.
But…
If we tell you to read the story of Carestack and listen to Dan Hall’s version of Convin’s conversation intelligence platform, then you’ll be convinced that follow-ups can definitely improve drastically with conversation intelligence
4. Employee stories
Why do you think Jeff Bezos, Ryan Rolansky, Simon Sinek, Satya Nadella, Indira Nooyi, and many others regularly post their stories and experiences on Linkedin.
In one of the Linkedin posts from 2017, Nadella described the immense pain and hardship his wife and he had to go through with their specially-abled son. He talks about empathy and the journey of people with disabilities.
An employee story is a brilliant way to improve employee branding, but at the same time, it speaks volumes about the company’s talent and values.
Just not leaders, any employee who’s contributed to the success of an organization deserves a story space.
Sales teams can make use of these stories too. How?
Organizations are entities and can’t make the prospect feel the same way an employee story can.
Remember, the employee and customer stories sound more realistic as they smell of human touch.
How Do Stories Affect Businesses?
If you listen to stories spoken by business leaders, customers, and employees, they’ll all exhibit a few common attributes.
These attributes make the story engaging, appealing, and persuasive for listeners.
- Teach- Stories are a great way to teach and an even better way to learn. With the help of storytelling, salespeople can teach prospects about a new product and help them understand its importance.
- Experience a future reality- Listeners can visualize a reality without stepping into it. (Not that we don’t have metaverse now). It’s easier to imagine how the future would look with the addition of a new software tool such as call recording software.
- Emotional connection- Stories can make prospects emotionally attached to a brand and product. It helps them relate to the story’s character and feel what the storyteller conveys.
- Memorable- Without a doubt, stories are the best way to make a message memorable. As with the use of parrot earlier, you will remember Convin. *feeling happy*
- Personalizing- Talking about a product or service adds no value to the prospect. But as soon as you talk about a similar customer who used the product, you immediately personalize the experience for the listener.
- Inspire- The stories of business leaders are an inspiration for many employees and customers. When one hears about their success journey, the listener is automatically glued to the outcome and wishes to achieve similar success.
Where does conversation intelligence come into the picture?
Storytelling may sound exciting and easy at first glance.
In reality, it’s tricky.
Keeping the audience engaged till the end is not everyone’s cup of tea.
Many prospects lose interest in the beginning, while many misinterpret the message.
However, if you and your colleagues are ready to ditch boring PowerPoint presentations with bullet points and move to a more meaningful presentation scheme, you must invest time in learning storytelling.
What do you need to turn into a stellar storyteller seller( Was that a tongue twister?😀)?- A sales coach and conversation intelligence software.
Related: How to coach remote sales teams in the new normal?
A sales coach can teach the nitty-gritty of storytelling. They’ll recite and listen to your stories while polishing the improvement areas. Sales coaches can often make up stories from their experiences and sales journey and record the stories for the sales reps.
A conversation intelligence tool will support the sales coach in accelerating the coaching process. The story recordings and coaching sessions can be added to the sales library. Coaches can listen to call recordings and filter down moments to understand if reps are using storytelling or not.
The deeper you go into storytelling, the better your business ideas start performing.
Just like any other idea, this may show a slow impact in the beginning, but gradually the stories can turn into your biggest arsenals.
Word of caution: Verify and validate essential facts about the story. Like the location, name, date, time, season, witness, etc. Don’t try to fluff too much and get caught in the act.
If you feel inspired and excited to use storytelling in your sales pitch, then here’s a small task for you.
Listen to the last 5 sales call recordings on your recording software and identify the common pain point of your audience. Now, go into your sales content repository and check for a customer success story that addresses the same issue. Build a comprehensive sales story script using it.
Happy Prospecting, you’ll!
Results first, payment later.
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